Opposite side of the hat to the drummer, about 6 inches up sort of mid way on the cymbal width angled away from the kit. I mainly use a schoeps cmc5, but sometimes a 414. The other day out of laziness I used an Audix d2 and got a surprisingly good sound. It tamed the ping of my crappy hihats well.

anguswoodhead wrote:I scored 2 more lulu fets in a deal the other month.Now using them for hats, overheads and ride - very happy.I position all mics on the drum roughly angled towards the drummers crutch. Drum mics and Hats mic are as close as I can get them without getting hit.I want to capture the impact of the hit not just the sound of the hit.

then after i like the sound and i am mixing i leave the channel open right up to the point the drummer starts hitting them like they are rats nicking his lunch and then i wonder what happened to that lovely dance i thought he was going to play on the hats when i was doing a mic test ..?

There are lightish hats on the market, but if you want really light hats going vintage or custom made seems to be the best option (to me).

I have a pair of Zilco hats from the late 1930s that are "paperthin" top and medium weight bottom - warm, subtle and a little silvery - try to pry them from my cold, dead hands.

For custom cymbals / hats I give another plug for Craig Lauritsen at CymbalUtopia in Adelaide - most of my cymbals have been custom made by Craig based on my description of the sound + weight that I'm after - he has nailed it every time.

What hats do we want to record? Apart from my 3 pairs (13" Zilcos, 14" Masterwork and 15" Lauritsens) I like Paiste soundedge hats as they have a nice "chick" and record clearly.

Interesing that most have picked condensor mics so far - I expected the old favourite KM84 to appear regularly.

Tried some different hats when recording my band's album, the drummer had some really light 12"s that he uses when jamming with his jazz mates. they did not work, at all, for metal. Ended up using his normal 15" heavy set (and living with the spill).